Hawker News

Southern Olive Oil

ambrook.com

31 pointsby surprisetalk32 comments

comrade1234[17 comments hidden]
I used to buy good virgin Spanish olive oil in tin - I had a Spanish friend that insisted that Spanish oil is better than Italian and that the Italians just have better marketing.

But then one day I realized that I live north of the alps and that I should therefore use virgin rapsöl instead. "Virgin Rape" in English. They re-marketed it as canola in America for obvious reasons but their version also has a couple of mutations that make the flavor milder. Virgin rape is different than processed rapeseed cooking oil - processed has no flavor while virgin tastes nutty.

Farmers have been growing it north of the Alps for thousands of years all the way up into Scandinavia. The fields of yellow flowers are everywhere.

One nearby farm that I buy it from, it tastes like hazelnut. At another farm it tastes like sunflower seed. It's softer than olive oil and doesn't have that bite at the back of your throat.

It makes beautiful mayonnaise - a nice rich yellow color and faint nuttiness - you can't use olive oil for mayonnaise because of the sharpness in olive oil.

kakacik[hidden]
There is no better olive oil than local greek one in my experience although what you describe sounds good too. Of course taste is highly subjective, but that simply works the best for me (and I am a visitor to all those countries, no strong emotional attachment to one from my country since we don't grow olives at all, its often shown by folks from southern Europe as you experienced too).

Also rapeseed oil doesn't have all the benefits extra virgin olive oil has but its a healthy choice too. It seems more temperature stable so doesn't burn as easily as EVOO so maybe better for various cooking.

maplant[hidden]
I learned this recently while doing an olive oil tasting in Greece: the bite in the back of your throat is caused by polyphenols - antioxidants. The bite is indicative that the olive oil is providing something healthy
avadodin[3 comments hidden]
Taste aside, rapeseed oil is rich in erucic acid unless it is made out of canola. Canola is a special low-erucic variety of rapeseed that is safe for consumption in large quantities.
Ravus[hidden]
Yeah. About that.

The tolerable daily intake of erucic acid is 7 mg per kg of body weight and the legal limit for erucic acid in canola oil is 2%. This means that an average adult (70 kg) could hit that intake with 24.5 grams of canola oil, which is less than 2 tablespoons for the non-metrically inclined.

terribleperson[hidden]
China produces roasted unrefined rapeseed oil (caizyou) from low erucic acid rapeseed these days. It might just be for export, but it exists.
righthand[3 comments hidden]
I use olive oil for mayonaise all the time and I don’t mind the sharpness/bitterness that comes from emulsification, it’s just another style.
DennisP[2 comments hidden]
I tried it and found that the taste mellowed a lot after a day or two in the fridge.
righthand[hidden]
I think acids like lemon juice, vinegar, or mustard help too.
bsoqk[hidden]
The tin part is interesting to me - I don’t know of any coops in Spain that still sell it in tin. It must be one of those things that people abroad deem authentic but which aren’t.
gib444[hidden]
Just fyi, virgin Rapeseed oil in English *

You don't ever want to utter or write the words "virgin rape"

otikik[3 comments hidden]
I'm Spanish, born in Jaén (the most Olive Oil producing province in Spain).

There's multiple kinds of olives, each producing different kinds of oil. The processing used also affects the end result (extra virgin olive oil comes from the first press, less quality oils from successive processing).

* Picual is the most popular one. It has a strong taste, that "bite" that you mention, and a long shelf life. This means that it is the most exported one. That is probably why you (and others) have associated olive oil with that strong profile. It is however not the only kind out there!

* Cornicabra is the second most popular one. It is milder than Picual in taste, but still strong and durable. You might find it in some specialist shops.

* Arbequina has less of that "bite" that you mention at the end. Unfortunately it has a shorter shelf life as well, which means that it also tends to be exported less.

Because of this is unlikely that you will find it outside of Spain. At the same time it would be the best kind for making mayonnaise, especially if you don't like the bite at the back of the throat (that some people actually enjoy).

And these are just the 3 more popular varieties. There's many more local, smaller ones.

jvican[hidden]
To give an idea of the massive contribution that Jaen (and marginally the rest of Spain) gives to olive oil supply, Spain olive oil exports are about ~45% of world supply. There’s a lot of olive oil in Jaen, and most of it is some of the best olive oil you can try. Most of the worldwide award winners in EVOO competitions are from Jaen, though not all, as other parts of Spain also contribute excellent olive oil.
DennisP[hidden]
I subscribe to an olive oil club, which buys a planeload of olive oil bottles each quarter from producers wherever it's harvest season, and ships them out to US subscribers. They send three bottles each time, including a mild which is often Arbequina. So thanks, I'll start using that one first :)
jvican[hidden]
Spain has some of the best and some of the worst olive oil in the world, mostly because it has about 45% of total world supply, and because people in the country care a lot about EVOOs.

It’s true that Italian olive oil has traditionally had a lot better marketing. When we talk about p70 and p80 olive oil quality, Spain wins hands down over Italy and other producers. Don’t get me wrong, Italy and Greece have excellent olive oil too, but it’s much harder to find and usually a lot more expensive. If you’re at a supermarket and have to decide between Italian and Spanish olive oil, chances are that the Spanish olive oil will be much better and, sometimes, even cheaper. A common practice in Italy, even though they don’t like to admit is, is that they import Spanish olive oil, relabel it, and sell it as their own.

One thing Italy, Greece, and other parts of the Mediterranean have is different and more diverse olive tree varieties. Frantoio is a good example.

The most important thing when buying great extra virgin olive oil is to buy straight from a well-known producer. If you buy from an intermediary, the chances that they’ve cut the EVOO with other oils (a common practice in markets outside of Southern Europe, like the US) to cheapen them is high.

saladdays[hidden]
Also very common in Sichuan cooking! https://themalamarket.com/products/caizi-you-sichuan-roasted...
OptionOfT[hidden]
> One nearby farm that I buy it from, it tastes like hazelnut. At another farm it tastes like sunflower seed.

I find that to be the case with a lot of product that are low quantity, locally produced.

Almost anything you buy at a supermarket is homogenized to make sure that when you buy Brand A at Store X tastes the same as Brand A at Store Y.

And even if it's the same company, the flavor should differ year by year, because it's based on a natural product. The harvests are different.

willmeyers[hidden]
I think this is really cool! I don't think Texas will make a significant dent in the global supply of olive oil any time soon, kind of the same way wine from Texas doesn't make a dent in global wine production. I imagine it'll be a small but high-quality regional thing. The weather is just too volatile. I can't see a farmer investing huge amounts of money and land in olive trees when a polar vortex can wipe them out (and then having to cut them back and wait for them to regrow which takes much longer than traditional crops). But nonetheless I think it's really cool to see how farmers are adapting and growing new things at scale like olive trees in Texas.
ssimpson[hidden]
My family has a bunch of land in central/south texas and this was my dad's dream for it. I am curious about resources on how to get started. Where to get the trees is probably the first big step.

looks like the A&M Agrilife extension has a pretty good reading resource: https://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/fruit-nut/wp-content/upl...

ofrzeta[hidden]
I saw machine harvesting on youtube. Machine assisted, that is. This is in Apulia which one of the southern states in Italy, so also Southern Olive Oil. Apulia is the biggest producer of olive oil in Italy.

https://youtu.be/tOQAnNmHkrk?t=361

mythrwy[2 comments hidden]
Olives are landscape tree in Phoenix Arizona and no one (well very few people) eat the olives.

When the olives ripen and fall, it creates a big mushy mess all over the yard and sidewalks, so there are services that go around and spray olive trees with a growth regulator to prevent fruiting.

I always felt the whole thing was a bit wasteful and they should have been turned into oil but I suppose harvest isn't practical at scale.

DennisP[hidden]
Doesn't seem that impractical since good olive oil producers pick by hand anyway. One example is Woodpecker Trail from the article.
_ZeD_[8 comments hidden]
>>> American South

I lost some neurons trying to understand the locution, then it talked about texas.

yeah... so it not from the "south of the americas" (think brazil, urugay, argentina...) but "the south of the u.s.a."

not really clear from someone from the other part of the atlantic

ssimpson[hidden]
I could see how that happens. Generally American <location> means the US, where if you were talking about the southern or central continent, you'd see South America, or Central America, much like North America. American South generally refers to the area south of what is called the "Mason-Dixon Line" and as far West as Texas. Texas is also part of the American Southwest, which includes California, Nevada, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Texas, maybe sometimes Colorado.
ssl-3[5 comments hidden]
It's like how the South of England refers the southern parts of England, and does not refer to France.
close04[4 comments hidden]
Maybe you misunderstood OP's point and the English language can be confusing. It's south-the region, not south-the direction. "South of the Americas" means "the south region of the Americas" which is not "south of where the Americas end". Or like the top of your head is the upper part of your head, not your hat.

Everyone knows Venezuela is in South America. Which is not south of where the Americas are (Antarctica) or, confusingly if you're US-centric, is not in the American South either (Texas).

The problem raised above and the root of the confusion is that the US adopted "America" as their own instead of what it actually is, the name of 2 entire continents, the Americas. American South means US South just for US-centric commenters.

To the world this is like Germany naming itself Europe and then claiming Bavaria is European South, different from Southern Europe (e.g. Greece) or South of Europe (e.g. Greece of Africa, depending on how you spell or understand this expression).

ssl-3[3 comments hidden]
I understood the point about the American South just fine.

I then supplied an analogy about the South of England, which I reckon to be closer to home for someone who made the distinction about the other side of the Atlantic.

That South of England analogy, by the way, was a description that I didn't know of myself until I went looking for something like that while drafting the previous response.

(After that even my smooth, featureless American corn-fed brain became willing to accept London as being somewhere in there.

Even though I know quite well that South of Cincinnati is not Cincinnati, but is instead Kentucky.)

close04[2 comments hidden]
That analogy would work better if England and France weren't very different places with very different names that nobody ever really confuses, except if you stumble on that quirk of unclear language (direction from the center, or direction from the edge). America and America are different places with the same name, which is not actually the same name because one of them is "U.S. of America".

Australia might be a better analogy/confusion. The continent also includes New Zealand and the country officially called Commonwealth of Australia is commonly referred to as Australia. At least in this case nobody considers New Zealanders to be Australians based on the continent name, or at least I could not find anything about this naming ever being used. In the Americas both continents are "America" and all people are "Americans", like all people in Europe are Europeans.

Any countries where a city (the capital) is named exactly the same will also check the confusion box.

ssl-3[hidden]
It's fine that you're confused, I guess. Or at least: I am certainly willing to accept that I am powerless to impart any top-down disambiguation of any descriptive expressions. I can't do anything about there being a plurality of Americas in the world. It is possible that there will also always be football, and football, and that the two sports will always share the same name despite their clear differences.

I'm not willing to apologize for any of that.

fuzzfactor[hidden]
Instead of butter, we're going to be using olive oil on our grits, grilling our Texas Toast in it and soaking it up with our cornbread ;)
MisterMunchkin[hidden]
It’s going to be interesting seeing how the world changes over the coming decades. I’m definitely pro-olive oil so more olive oil is more good, but never seeing snow again is going to suck.
RobGR[hidden]
I live near the Dell's Favorite olive oil farm, was happy to see them in this article.